Illinois legislator wants state to revisit Equal Rights Amendment

When Gov. Edward Dunne signed into law on June 26, 1913, a bill making Illinois the first state east of the Mississippi where women could vote, the milestone was hailed - and decried - around the world. It's true that Dunne and the legislature quickened the pace toward the 19th Amendment. Yet Illinois legislation didn't give the sexes equal voting rights. They won the right to vote for presidential electors, mayor, aldermen and most other local offices, but not for governor, state representatives or members of Congress. Here are some of the women suffragettes who fought the battle and won by 1920.

John ByrneTribune reporter

More than 40 years after the Equal Rights Amendment was first passed by the U.S. Congress, an Illinois state senator is taking another crack at getting her colleagues in Springfield to adopt the provision that would enshrine in the U.S. Constitution the idea that rights can't be abridged on account of sex.

Sen. Heather Steans, D-Chicago, said the proposed amendment is still relevant today given the ongoing debates about equal pay, abortion rights and other issues on which women are fighting for equality.

And she said it's symbolically important to "get Illinois off the list" of 15 states that have not yet adopted the proposed amendment. The other holdouts are mostly traditionally more conservative states in the southern and western parts of the country.

"Illinois has been in the forefront of equal rights," Steans said. "I think this is some unfinished business, an opportunity to right a historic wrong."

Steans has supported proposals for the General Assembly to adopt the amendment in previous years, without success.

The amendment appeared to die in 1982 after only 35 states passed it by the deadline that Congress set after adopting it in 1972. That was three short of the 38 needed to amend the Constitution. Supporters of the amendment are now pushing a "three state solution," arguing the 1982 deadline should not apply. If three more states pass it, the supporters will try to make the case that there is no need for the U.S. Congress to start the amendment process over.

Steans' proposal is scheduled to get a hearing on Wednesday, she said.